For the West to Live, 'Equality' Must Die.  Equality is the chief faux virtue of our time.  Our obsession with it brings to mind the great G.K. Chesterton's observation, "The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes.  The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected."  Long ago the West erred by exalting "equality" at, ultimately, quality's — and sanity's — expense.  In fact, it's at a point where boys claiming girlhood are allowed in girls' bathrooms and locker areas based on equality dogma.  How do we correct this mistake?  First, stop being connedservative and realize that few people have pondered equality deeply and that, of those who have, few actually believe in it.

Macy's holiday pajama pics prompt backlash for perceived 'racist' photo.  Macy's product images for its holiday pajamas feature a number of families decked out in festive gear, but some on social media are calling one photo in particular racist.  The collected images shared on social media depict a white couple with children twice, an interracial LGBTQ couple with biracial children, and a black mother with three black children.  Naturally, social media users — in particular, a Cincinnati city councilman, Jeff Pastor — wondered why the family that did not feature a father was black.

The Editor says...
The only thing unusual about this ad is that it it NOT an inversion of the truth, as most advertising is.  Most advertising depicts abnormal relationships as normal, good things as bad, bad things as good, chronic illness as inevitable, and $50,000 as a reasonable price for a new car.  In practically all television ads, the criminals are white males, and all blacks are either the heroes, the experts, or the victims of those evil white people.  In the advertisement discussed in the article above, the black family has no father.  That is not an exceptional situation.  Such a depiction is not something to get upset about. 

Elizabeth Warren and Beto O'Rourke, Cultural Appropriators.  Elizabeth Warren wants to be Native American.  Robert Francis O'Rourke wants to be Latino.  But they aren't.  And they're being hoist on the left's own petard.  I'm a fan of cultural appropriation.  I think it's actually healthy for the dominant society to incorporate some aspects of other cultures.  This makes us more diverse, more interesting, and more tolerant.  But many on the left strongly disagree with me on this.  They hate themselves for loving yoga, and don't think two white women should be able to own a burrito cart in Portland.  They are adamant about it.  This leads to what some might call cognitive dissonance, or even hypocrisy.  After all, the people most inclined to frequent yoga studios and burrito carts in the Pacific Northwest are rich white liberals.

Fish and Wildlife Service makes diversity a priority — in its own population of biologists.  The Delmarva fox squirrel, an endangered critter that scampers through the woods and grassland of this pristine island in the Chesapeake Bay, may not care about the race or gender of the wildlife biologists safeguarding its home.  But the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service back in Washington does.  The agency's leaders doubled down on an Obama-era program that made hiring of minorities and women a top priority, and managers are raising red flags about the resulting staffing problems at the more than 500 wildlife refuges across the country.

Diversity vs.  Dignity.  Do identity politics truly represent "the demand for dignity," as centrist political philosopher Francis Fukuyama asserts in the subtitle of his new book, Identity:  The Demand for Dignity and the Politics of Resentment?  Personally, "dignity" would strike me as an odd characterization of such recent manifestations of identity politics as your local gay pride parade, Ferguson's bouts of undocumented shopping, Bruce Jenner in a ball gown, or the Asia Argento vs.  Rose McGowan #MeToo spat.  Nor do I expect the upcoming Supreme Court nomination hearing/teen sex comedy to be a high point in the history of American dignity.  If I were looking for an alliterative subtitle, I might try instead "The Demand for Dominance."  Contemporary identity politics seem far less about Jackie Robinson maintaining a stiff upper lip as he demonstrates his right to play baseball than about Serena Williams feeling entitled to go off on the tennis umpire.

A Perfect Storm Threatens America's Survival.  With identity politics cloaked in the guise of diversity, is there room for competence?  Federal and state grants come laden with various demands for diversity.  Businesses and government institutions find themselves saddled with vice presidents and directors of diversity.  Universities have indoctrinated their students with diversity to the point where white males are now under direct assault throughout our society.  The diversity purge is a threat to fundamental excellence in major businesses and institutions. [...] Whatever happened to the notion of the best and most qualified person for the job?  How is identity politics helpful to our country?  It's not.  It's damaging.  It's a Democrat thing.  Any fool can see this.

Tsk, Tsk:  Senate Democrats talk diversity for us, but not for them.  You know how Democrats so often talk about diversity as a goal in itself?  For others anyway.  Now comes a serious problem for some of their candidates seeking to tip the narrow Senate party balance in their party's direction come Nov. 6.  In a survey done by Democrats themselves the figures reveal that some of the most endangered Senate Democratic candidates have the least diverse staffs of all.

13 Ways To Combat Snarky, Mainstream Immigration Arguments.  [#4]  Multi-Cultural Leftist:  Our diversity is our strength!  You:  It wasn't for Yugoslavia or Rwanda or Northern Ireland.  Sometimes, it's a deep source of conflict that leads to bigger and bigger government and fewer freedoms.  Look at how Western European countries are turning into police states to manage all their fresh new "diversity."  There weren't always checkpoints on London Bridge, you know.

Virtue-Signaling Run Amok in America.  The social consensus pushed by the media and the culture at large has placed some sort of practical value on "diversity" in many industries in regard to inconsequential things like race, sex, or sexual preference, and has somehow forced those inconsequential things as viable considerations in the hiring process to create a workforce more "diverse" in those things that shouldn't matter.  It's often viewed as a "progressive," or even "centrist," thing to promote this line of thought.  But hiring someone who is less practically qualified to do a job would hardly be viewed as "progress" in any reasonable sense.  His team that he manages might be made more colorful by his hypothetical decision, but it would not be more productive or competitive for his having done so.

The Pox of Multiculturalism.  What the left calls "multiculturalism" is actually the systematic destruction of cultures and the replacement of these cultures by a synthetic, artificial, and meaningless global culture.  When the left talks about "diversity," it really means the crushing of differences in thought, values, and art into a sort of baby food which neither nourishes the soul or elevates the mind.  This is because cultural differences are based on geography and exist in nations and regions rather than in the nonsensical "global" community.  Indeed, there are cultural differences within most nations of any size that reflect the differences within parts of a nation.

Reject the Diversity Mandate.  Sometimes meritocracy will yield diversity; sometimes it won't.  The point is that it doesn't matter.  Diversity should not be an end in itself; excellence is the goal.  Rejecting the primacy of diversity constitutes a head-on assault on the received wisdom of Washington and elite American culture. [...] Treating people the same way regardless of their race or sex used to be considered the definition of fairness; now it is understood to be vicious and intolerable.

Ontario Bar Requires Lawyer Pledge To "Promote Equality".  The Ontario bar association has adopted a rule under which all lawyers "must prepare and submit a personal 'Statement of Principles' attesting that we value and promote equality, diversity and inclusion," according to Bruce Pardy in the National Post, who says it's a bad idea.

Ontario lawyers resist mandatory promote-equality pledge.  Lakehead University law faculty member Ryan Alford has filed a challenge to the new Ontario bar rule requiring all lawyers to prepare and submit personal "Statement of Principles" avowing their support for equality, diversity, and inclusion.  The rules have drawn fire across Canada as compelled speech, but the bar association turned down a request that individual lawyers be allowed exemptions if they believe the requirement violates their conscience.

The Scourge of Multiculturalism.  The argument made by immigration and refugee enthusiasts, namely that the Western democracies were founded and settled by immigrants and therefore should continue to welcome newcomers, is valid only to a point.  In the course of time the original settlers created a national identity, a sense of communal membership in a common world unified by custom and law.  It is that identity that should be preserved. [...] To say "we are a nation of immigrants," then, is immaterial.  We are now a nation of citizens.  Skilled immigrants, properly screened and taking into account real domestic needs, should be part of the country's future, but not in multiples that threaten to dilute a nation's internal cohesion, not from backward countries whose inhabitants are all too often uneducated, illiterate and functionally unassimilable, and certainly not from parts of the world — in particular, the Islamic world — whose history, culture, theology and politics have ranged it against everything that Western civilization comprises.

The Impending Death of Multiculturalism.  We are all familiar with the Democratic Party gambit of packing the electorate with poor, third-world immigrants, all but guaranteed to vote for the party who offers them a living on the taxpayers' largesse.  While progressives still roll their eyes at the suggestion that this is why third-world immigration has been encouraged — the point is no longer even worth arguing.  The fact that this immigration policy has, for many decades, had the effect of moving the country to the left is uncontestable.

Conformity and Manipulation:  The American Virtues.  "My biggest flaw and strength," says James Damore, "may be that I see things very differently than normal."  This simple sentence reveals the essence of our fraying social fabric.  For Damore's "strength" — his rare ability to think for himself and exercise independent judgment — naturally leads to conflict with the majority, who, in their stupidity and weakness, must deem his virtue a "flaw," a sign that he is not "normal."  For most people — those bundles of herd affect — "truth," as they can understand it, is nothing but a means for their personal interests, which are mostly material and, beyond that, trivial.  Hence their utter inability to understand a man like James Damore and their natural disdain for any principled truth-teller.  The former chess prodigy is now blacklisted from the big tech companies, despite having, in the language of the corporate rabble, a proven track record of success as a software engineer.  In the Guardian article from which I have quoted, we learn that Damore was diagnosed with a mild form of autism in his mid-20s.  Paul Lewis, the liberal author of this subtle hatchet job, based — where else — in San Francisco, describes Damore's first failure to submit to the diversity idol.

Yale college removes portraits of white men to promote diversity, then re-installs them.  The head of one of Yale University's residential colleges said this week that he was misinterpreted when he announced that portraits of his white male predecessors would be taken down.  In a Nov. 1 email to students, Pierson College head Stephen Davis wrote that the portraits, which were initially removed to make space for the college's annual Halloween dance, would not immediately be put back up as customary.

A Foundation of Nonsense.  It seems today that Western societies are painfully re-learning things that were common knowledge a few generations ago.  The old axiom, fences make good neighbors, was replaced with "diversity is our strength."  Every time a swarthy fellow blows up in the public square, we inch a bit closer to the realization that diversity is a nightmare.  That's the part we see.  The part we don't see, at least not yet, is the crumbling of the foundation stones of the modern West.

Diversity Is Our Terror.  New York City is an incredibly diverse place.  Here, an Uzbek Muslim immigrant in on a visa diversity lottery can run over Argentinian tourists, an Egyptian-Palestinian Muslim can shoot a Danish musician on the observation deck of the Empire State Building, Saudi Muslims can fly planes into the World Trade Center killing people from 77 countries, an Afghan Muslim can plant pressure cooker bombs in Chelsea, a Lebanese Muslim can open fire on a van of Jewish students and a Pakistani-Kuwaiti and Iraqi Muslim can bomb the World Trade Center.  Truly, diversity is our terror.  Nationally, the perpetrators and plotters of Islamic terrorism in just the last ten years have included Pakistanis (San Bernardino, Garland, UC Merced), Chechens (Boston Marathon bombing), Afghans (Orlando shootings), Somalis (Portland Christmas Tree bomb plot, Minnesota mall stabbing, Ohio State Car Ramming, Columbus Machete Attack), Palestinians (Fort Hood, Chattanooga recruitment shootings) and Iraqis (Bowling Green plot).  That's a whole lot of diversity.  And it's killing us.

Democrats need to turn Japanese.  Japan is an island.  The people do not believe in nor want cultural diversity.  I greatly respect that.  It is a survival mechanism that thus far has avoided a 9/11 or being overrun by hordes of rapists.  The Japanese look at the rest of the world and double down.

How to Destroy a Nation.  If you want to destroy a nation, you find a way to denigrate its belief in itself.  Smear its founders.  Belittle its accomplishments.  Pillory it for failing to live up to its ideals.  Mock its most sacred traditions.  Deride its heroes.  In the end, you will no longer have a nation, but only a collection of tribes, who occupy the same space but share no common concepts.  There is nothing to unify them.  In other words, you will be able to pinpoint that country with geographical data, but you will not find a national people.

Former Agent:  Secret Service Lowered Standards In Pursuit Of Diversity.  As the U.S. Secret Service sought greater diversity in its ranks, the agency lowered its standards, former agent Dan Bongino says in a new book on the inner workings of the government agency assigned to protect the President of the United States.  This accusation has led to a war of words between the former agent and the agency he used to work for.  The lowering of standards has been ongoing since at least "the early 2000s," according to the book.

Professor who called diversity training a 'waste' resigns after dean punishes him.  A Duke University Divinity School professor who called diversity training a "waste" of time has resigned after disciplinary proceedings were launched against him and he was barred by his dean from faculty meetings.  At issue is a February email in which Professor Paul Griffiths advised his colleagues not to bother with a proffered volunteer diversity training, called "Racial Equity Institute Phase I Training."  Slated for March, it would work to ensure the divinity school is "equitable and anti-racist in its practices and culture," according to the invite.  "I exhort you not to attend this training," Griffiths stated in his Feb. 6 listserv reply to his peers.  "Don't lay waste your time by doing so.  It'll be, I predict with confidence, intellectually flaccid:  there'll be bromides, clichés, and amen-corner rah-rahs in plenty."

This Professor Resigned Rather Than Go to Diversity Training.  Uh-oh, a "training" session.  Anyone who's ever worked for an entity with a human resources department knows what that's going to be like:  two very, very long days of "workshops" in which overpaid "training" hucksters — sorry, I meant consultants — haul out the PowerPoint slides and waste your time with yada-yada about multiculturalism, structural racism, microagressions, and whatever else is in the social-justice-warrior weapons cache these days. [...] So this is what you're being strongly urged to attend.  And we all know what "strongly urged" means:  Show up or you will pay the price.

The End of Diversity.  [Scroll down]  Eventually, of course, the Progs figured out that this was a loser so they moved onto celebrating diversity.  Unlike tolerance or sensitivity, diversity has the benefit of putting everyone on the same level.  One race is as good as another.  Men and women can do all the same things.  All cultures are the same.  Modern life was going to be a celebration of the beauty and variety of life!  Well, except the white parts. [...] The internal incoherence of multiculturalism means that they will forever have to be dashing about in an effort to keep the plates spinning.  One day we're celebrating diversity and the next day we're stoning a heretic for noting that people are different.

Diversity: where every type of person is accepted but one.
Mother Kicked Out of 'Multicultural Playgroup' Because She's Caucasian.  Tara Coverdale took her two small children — an 8-month-old and a 4-year-old — to an inner city park in Sydney, Australia to play recently, only to be told she's not welcomed there.  "I'm sorry you can't come here," a worker from Alexandria Park Community Centre told her.  "It's a multicultural playgroup.  Can I ask what your cultural background is?"  Well, Coverdale is white, Australian, has blonde hair, and freckles.  This didn't help her cause with the "multicultural police."

The King of Hatefacts.  [Scroll down]  Even the sane elements of the backlash were wrong.  The Federalist claimed he should have focused on culture and not race because it's not more white people we need, it's more Westerners.  This is a beautiful notion and I fully agree with it, but here on earth, we're not taking in immigrants who want to assimilate.  In fact, we are openly encouraging immigrants not to assimilate.  Public school teachers have dedicated their careers to eradicating patriotism and teaching our children how cruel and unusual we have been throughout history.  Politicians are knowingly avoiding immigrants who assimilate and focusing on ones who will antagonize the native population.  This is especially true in Britain, where Tony Blair's speechwriter conceded as much.  Look at the London bombings.  They were all radicalized in Britain.  One of them was a Jamaican who grew up in Bradford, where the Muslim population is booming.  Since the bombings, London has elected a Muslim mayor who proudly exclaims, "Immigrants shouldn't have to assimilate."  Here in America we have the Tsarnaev brothers, who grew up reading comic books and watching sports; but after years of being told America [is bad], they began to believe their relatives back in Chechnya.  Then they blew us up.

Rescind the Executive Order — And Replace It With Many Tougher Ones.  The president cannot lose here.  We must protect our borders; keep out the terrorists and rein in out-of-control immigration.  It is the signal issue that got him elected.  It is also the signal action needed to save this country from the Left's malevolent intentions.  The Left is attempting to subvert our country by simply replacing its population with a more malleable, sympathetic one.  Unlike the immigrants of yesteryear, today's are largely illiterate, welfare-dependent, unwilling to learn our language and definitely hostile to American culture and traditions.  And while they are in many cases fleeing conditions created by their countries' socialist policies, they nonetheless bring socialist ideas with them.  As our country has become more "multi-cultural", it has drifted ever leftward.

Justifying Exclusion through 'Diversity'.  It is common, at colleges and universities across the country, for the test scores of Asian-American students who have been admitted to a given college to be higher than the test scores of whites or of blacks or of Hispanics. [...] But what justifies diversity?  Nothing but unsupported assertions, repeated endlessly, piously, and loudly.  Today, as in the past, diversity is essentially a fancy word for group quotas.  It is one of a number of wholly subjective criteria — such as "leadership" — used to admit students to colleges and universities according to their group membership, rather than according to their individual qualifications.  This is not something new.  Nor is it something confined to the United States.

The 'Diversity' Fraud.  Nothing so epitomizes the politically correct gullibility of our times as the magic word "diversity."  The wonders of diversity are proclaimed from the media, extolled in the academy and confirmed in the august chambers of the Supreme Court of the United States.  But have you ever seen one speck of hard evidence to support the lofty claims?  Although diversity has become one of the leading buzzwords of our time, it has a history that goes back several generations.

Ending Multicultural Madness.  Judging from the actions of Democrat politicians, immigrants who come here from Third World cultures and with Third World mindsets are not expected to blend in.  Heaven forbid, as that would be an affront to their "dignity" and go against the grain of multiculturalism.  As a result, separate enclaves are popping up across the country, even in the heartland.  The Democratic Party celebrates Balkanization as this enlarges their constituency base, never caring how it weakens overall American culture and strength.  In a commencement address, Secretary of State John Kerry echoed this theme.  He lectured Americans that we must be prepared to live in a borderless world, a world that he and his fellow globalists are busily trying to construct.  And here, Kerry did not mean borderless in terms of only goods and services and capital.  He meant people, too.  And John Kerry's position is in full accord with the agenda of the globalist elite.

U.S. Workplace English Rules Discriminatory, Foreign Language Demands Aren't.  Requiring employees in the United States to speak a foreign language is not discriminatory but forcing them to speak English violates federal law under a sweeping order issued by the Obama administration to crack down on "national origin discrimination" in the workplace.  The government's new enforcement guidelines state that bilingual requirements don't meet discrimination claims under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act but English-only rules do because they're restrictive language policies.  The administration asserts that the new rules, which cover a broad range of scenarios that could get employers in trouble, were created because the American workforce is "increasingly ethnically diverse."

FDNY hires nine ex-felons amid effort to boost diversity.  The newly-minted class of FDNY probationary firefighters includes an unprecedented nine rookie Bravest with felony convictions, including one who did jail time for gun possession, insiders told The [New York] Post.  The nine ex-felons, all minorities, were among 295 probies who graduated from the Fire Academy on Nov. 2, as critics charge the FDNY has loosened hiring standards to diversify its ranks.  One of the nine, a black 32-year-old who joined the city as an EMT in 2012, served more than a year in the Nassau County Correctional Center after two 2005 convictions for carrying loaded guns.

Feds Order Law Enforcement Agencies to Ignore Drug Use, Criminal Records to Hire Minorities.  In a push to hire minority police officers, the Obama administration is asking the nation's 18,000 law enforcement agencies to forgive drug use, disregard the criminal records of candidates from "underrepresented communities" and lower standards on written and physical exams.  It's part of the administration's Advancing Diversity in Law Enforcement initiative following a string of officer-involved shootings involving African Americans.  Key to the mission is the racial diversification of local law enforcement agencies so that they "better reflect the diversity of the communities they serve."

Obama's 'Diversity' Mandates Put 'Progressive' Agenda over National Security.  "President Obama released a Memorandum to promote diversity in the national security workforce," National Security Advisor Susan Rice announced Wednesday.  "This is why that makes us safer and stronger."  Rice's "why" is long on self-serving blather and short on "how."  She touches on "building an international order" with the UN, fighting Ebola in West Africa and pushing the transfer of wealth via "climate change" treaty (that has not been ratified by the Senate).  But the talking point to accept and repeat without question is that "our diversity" is "what makes us truly exceptional."  If you're an Opposite Day "progressive" dependent on "divide and conquer" tactics to rally favored demographics and marginalize others, what better way to do it than with a reverse "E Unum Pluribus" motto?

Diversity will be the death of America, yes, literally.  Well, well this is just a natural extension to the Left's war on cops isn't it?  And it goes so well along with the Left's sick devotion to "equality".

Department of Social Justice:  LEOs Can Be Criminals or Non-Citizens, So Long As They Aren't White Guys.  If you want a job in law enforcement, not being a criminal is okay, but the important thing is not to be a white man: [...] Since the only real criterion is not to be a white male, and white males are less likely to have criminal records, then obviously checking into the criminal histories of potential law enforcement officers would be counterproductive.  If being a criminal doesn't count against you, why should not being an American citizen?

DOJ: Diversity Trumps Ability to Pass Criminal Background Checks.  On Wednesday [10/5/2016], the Department of Justice (DOJ) released the "Advancing Diversity in Law Enforcement" report, which highlights hiring practices in the law enforcement community.  In the report.  the DOJ discusses problems associated with diversifying police forces, claiming racial diversity is more important than being a law-abiding citizen.

Obama's DOJ blames criminal, citizenship checks of job seekers for lack of police diversity.  Local police departments' use of criminal background checks and citizenship requirements to vet job applicants are among the barriers limiting diversity in law enforcement, a new Justice Department report finds.  The report, released Wednesday in conjunction with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, critiques several widely used police-hiring practices — noting that over-reliance on such criteria "may limit certain underrepresented communities' representation in law enforcement agencies."  "Ensuring that law enforcement agencies represent the diversity of the communities they serve can help restore trust and improve policing," said Deputy Assistant Attorney General Vanita Gupta.

DOJ: Criminal Background Checks, Citizenship Requirements Barriers to Police-Force Diversity.  The Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) released a comprehensive report Wednesday [10/5/2016] examining law enforcement hiring, recruitment, and retention policies with the aim of increasing diversity in police departments.  The report — "Advancing Diversity in Law Enforcement" — highlighted barriers to diversity within police departments, such as "the use of criminal background checks" which the researchers found "is likely to disproportionately impact racial minority applicants."  The report also found that U.S. citizenship requirements "may prevent a considerable number of racial and ethnic minorities — many of whom have valuable foreign language skills — from being hired by law enforcement agencies."

Air Force Announces It Will Mandate Diversity Quotas In Candidate Pools For Key Positions.  The Air Force announced a new set of 13 inclusion initiatives Friday [9/30/2016] with the goal of ensuring the force isn't as white, male and heterosexual as it is now.  Air Force officials are intent on building upon a foundation of nine initiatives from 2015, in order to boost diversity.  Those nine initiatives weren't enough to make the Air Force as diverse as desired, which is why it is taking more intensive steps in 2016.

Evil Twins - Why Multiculturalism Is As Wicked As Nazism.  Few people who believe in multiculturalism will have the slightest inkling of its origins.  Brainwashed by a tsunami of state propaganda, most people in the West believe multiculturalism is a benign, progressive ideology.  They hold this belief because core to this ideology is the assertion that all races and all cultures are equal.  All people no matter their race or creed share the same desire to live alongside each other in peaceful coexistence.  Establishing such a vibrant mix of races and cultures will bring enrichment and diversity — but only to the West.  Enriched and diverse multicultural societies will spawn a kaleidoscopic utopia where all join hands and sing "Kumbaya", and intolerance, violence and hatred will have been overcome forever.  Not only is this is a childish fantasy that ignores centuries of human evolution and interracial/inter-tribal conflicts, it's also a completely false understanding of what multiculturalism is and why it came into being.

Whites are the new Indians.  [Scroll down]  A Japanese city is Japanese.  A Mexican city is Mexican.  An Indian city is Indian.  A Chinese city is Chinese.  It is only in Europe and the Anglo satellites where you have this phenomenon of cities being not just slightly divergent from the general population but foreign to it.  New York, for example, is not an Anglo-American city, but an Israeli-Puerto Rican-Chinese-Pakistani-Ecuadorian-Mexican-Filipino-Dominican-African-Korean city.  Paris is not a French city, but an Algerian-Moroccan-Portuguese-Senegalese-Vietnamese-Malian city.  London is not a British city, but an Indian-Pakistani-Jamaican-Polish-Bengali-Arab-Chinese-Nigerian city.  It will pose a geopolitical problem in the future, that metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties in the same country are different races from one another.

Is American Multiculturalism a Failure?  Has the great American experiment in diversity ended in failure?  That's the impression you might get from an array of recent developments — Black Lives Matter protests, anti-Muslim sentiment, resentment of undocumented immigrants and, last but not least, Donald Trump.  We seem to be loudly fracturing and separating, not coming together.  We're all pluribus and no unum.

Ugly Minority Girls Are Winning Beauty Pageants To Satisfy The Diversity Agenda.  Toxic SJW notions of "beauty" (think awful role model and alleged scammer Tess Munster) are well-known.  Sadly, it appears that the need to appease certain groups has now filtered down to giving beauty pageant titles to girls based on their race or ethnicity.  Two recent "winners" of state-based national beauty pageants, Magnolia Maymuru (Miss World, Northern Territory, Australia) and Arianna Quan (Miss America, Michigan), are so unbelievably plain and even ugly that the "beauty" in beauty pageant should have been removed from the contests they each entered.  In the case of Quan, the biggest criticisms came from her ancestral homeland of China.  Chinese netizens need not fear the kind of racism accusations that would be leveled at white Americans questioning whether she deserved the Miss America title for one of America's most populous states (Miss America's national event will be in September).  Media coverage of Maymuru's crowning was ecstatic, namely because, in the words of many racial quota-leaning commenters, "it was about time" that an Aboriginal Australian won such a title.  Few online respondents dared to call her unattractive due to the near certainty of them being labeled as racist bigots.  She eventually placed in the top 10 for the Miss World Australia final, "beating" much more attractive competition.

A World Without Western Civ.  [Scroll down]  Most uncomfortable for egalitarians and their ilk is that there are vast landmasses — sometimes entire continents — where the indigenous inhabitants have invented virtually nothing.  Sub-Saharan Africans are not known for contributing much to rocket science, and black Americans are so underrepresented as inventors that everyone has heard a gazillion times about the mulatto who improved blood-storage methods and George Washington Carver's wondrous dalliances with the magical peanut.  The so-called "Native Americans" are credited with inventing the spinning top, which somehow proved incapable of defending them against the white man and his guns.

Diversity vs.  Meritocracy.  Some believe that the notion of meritocracy arose in Great Britain at the end of the nineteenth century.  Apparently, it was offered as an antidote to aristocratic privilege.  Instead of choosing government servants by their breeding, the British decided to use an examination.  It was the only way to ensure that the best and the brightest were running the country. [...] Britain's sister republic, America, has long since sacrificed mush of its own meritocracy on the bonfire of diversity.  Of course, there are still islands of merit, but, for the most part, we are more worried about how diverse we are than about how good we are.

Fundamentally Transformed.  The only hope for history's rare multiracial, multiethnic, and multireligious nations is to adopt a common culture, one that artificially suppresses the natural instinct of humans to identify first with their particular tribe.  America, in the logical spirit of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, was exceptional among modern societies in slowly evolving from its original, largely European immigrant population to a 21st-century assimilated, integrated, and intermarried multiracial society, in which religious and racial affiliations were incidental, not essential, to one's public character and identity.

America In Free Fall.  President Obama has largely ignored the old ideal of the melting pot and in its place preferred a salad-bowl multiculturalism of competing ethnicities, tribes, and races, whose activism wins concessions from local, state and federal governments.  Casual comments and references by Obama-like "bring a gun" to a knife fight, the "bitter clingers" of Pennsylvania, and "typical white person"-stoked racial tensions.  So did Attorney General Eric Holder's crude referrals to "my people" and a "nation of cowards." [...] Apparently, the Obama administration never considered that a multiracial America united by one culture was an historical exception.  Everywhere else, multiculturalism and tribalism without assimilation, integration, and intermarriage have proved to be an abject and usually violent catastrophe:  most recently, in the former Soviet Union, the Balkans, Rwanda, and the Middle East.  Europe's attempt to emulate a multiracial United States is ending in utter failure with unchecked immigration, multicultural incoherence, and rising Islamism.

Is Diversity Our Strength?  However great the shock of the massacre in Orlando, it is only a matter of time before we start hearing again the fact-free dogma that "diversity is our strength."  If there is any place in the Guinness Book of World Records for words repeated the most often, over the most years, without one speck of evidence, "diversity" should be a prime candidate.  Is diversity our strength?  Or anybody's strength, anywhere in the world?  Does Japan's homogeneous population cause the Japanese to suffer?  Have the Balkans been blessed by their heterogeneity — or does the very word "Balkanization" remind us of centuries of strife, bloodshed and unspeakable atrocities, extending into our own times?  Has Europe become a safer place after importing vast numbers of people from the Middle East, with cultures hostile to the fundamental values of Western civilization?

Study: Changes in racial composition lead to decline in church attendance.  The more mixed the Sunday morning pews are, the fewer people are likely to be in them.  That's the primary finding of a new study from Baylor University published in the current Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion.  Researchers studied the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, where racial diversity doubled from 1993 to 2012, and found that, at the same time, churches with the greatest diversity growth also had the steepest declines in attendance.

Being black or female or talented or intelligent isn't enough.
One in six BBC stars 'must be gay or lesbian or disabled' by 2020 says new staff-hiring guidelines at the corporation.  One in six of all on-screen BBC roles must go to lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender or disabled people by 2020, the corporation's new diversity targets state.  In a bid to deter criticism that it has been failing to reflect its audience, the BBC has pledged that LGBT and disabled people will each make up eight percent of all on-air and on-screen roles.

Whereas the Founders prized unity, 21st-century America has embraced diversity.
The Contradictions of Diversity.  [Scroll down]  Appearance and accent are no longer reliable indicators of race.  If Ted Cruz did not self-identify as half Cuban-American, he might easily be tagged with almost any ethnicity.  Barack Obama — middle-class, Hawaiian-raised, prep-schooled, and of half Kenyan ancestry — had no early experience with the African-American underclass; Barack Hussein Obama massaged that fact in a way Barry Soetero might not have been able to.  The current career move of ethnicizing names, along with highlights of hyphenation and accent marks, reflects an unspoken reality:  Ethnic heritage is now often so impossible to verify that bumper-sticker linguistic aids are vital.  Professor Joseph Smith is not so likely an affirmative-action candidate as he most certainly would be if he chose to identify with his mother's line and became José López-Smith[.]

Magic Honky Theory.  For as long as most people reading this have been alive, the cult in charge of America has preached the need for full integration.  This has led to endless campaigns to "desegregate" the schools, housing, jobs, sports clubs, etc. [...] The way around this has been to argue that "diversity" makes everyone better somehow.  This proximity effect only works in your neighborhood, of course.  The bunkered enclaves where our betters live are almost all white.  Like so much of what these people say in public, it is intended to obscure, not explain.  Ask these people why diversity is good and they start mumbling about their favorite Ethiopian restaurant.  Western civilization did OK without having a single Ethiopian restaurant for a few millennia, but we're to believe it is now a necessity.

The Fruits of Multiculturalism, Abroad and at Home.  Once upon a time there were people who naively fantasized about how all the incompatible cultures of the world were going to magically blend, weaving a beautiful tapestry of colors and variations.  They called this "Multiculturalism". [...] The theory of multiculturalism has always been a tonic for simpletons, since it celebrates the perpetuation and imposition of an incompatible culture, still being practiced by those who carry it, upon a host culture with which it is mutually exclusive.  Multiculturalism is entirely subversive.  It is intended to force one or more cultures upon the hosts who do not want or need them.  Since both cultures cannot successfully coexist within the host, which has its own successful working culture, the purpose of the exercise has always been fraudulent.

America's Toxic Brew: "Diversity".  The PC crowd preaches constantly that "diversity" is our "strength".  Horse hockey!  There is no strength whatsoever when everyone is part of a group rather than being an individual.  Strength comes from a common language and culture — all of these "hyphenated" appellations are doing nothing to bring people together and doing everything to divide us.  This is why we are fracturing as a society and devolving into a balkanized country.

How to Make Sense of an Incoherent America.  Sometime in the 1990s the growing contradictions of affirmative action in a multiracial society became problematic.  Ethnic ancestry was often neither easily identifiable nor readily commensurate with class status, and so gave way to a more popular term:  "diversity."  Under diversity, it no longer mattered so much how wealthy or poor one was.  Nor was it a concern exactly who one's grandparents had been — at long as, in some vague way, one was non-"white."  If so, one was diverse.  That was deemed in and of itself a good thing.  We no longer worried as much whether someone enjoying affirmative action status was upper middle-class or the child of a surgeon.  Nor did it matter that one was only one-quarter "Latino" or, in fact, took the rarer Elizabeth Warren or Ward Churchill route of fabricating ethnic ancestry out of whole cloth.

How to Destroy a People Through Immigration.  Multiculturalism is simply a tool for divide and conquer.  Is there then any point in trying to comprehend its logic at all?  Maybe it was just a convenient excuse used for disrupting the established order of nation states by flooding them with mass immigration under the cover of "cultural diversity" or historical inevitability.  If that is the case, there never was any coherent logic behind it, so we shouldn't waste our time looking for one.  Many of those promulgating it never believed a word of it themselves.  Multiculturalism is the new Allah:  Don't understand, just obey.

Multiculturalism: What the Left Would Prefer You Didn't Know.  Multiculturalism is a very specific political philosophy which could scarcely be further removed from the idea that we should live in one big, happy, multi-ethnic melting pot and all just get along.  That's because it means the exact opposite.  It's about separatism, not integration.

Multiculturalism is a Failure.  German Chancellor Angela Merkel declared that in Germany, multiculturalism has "utterly failed."  Both Australia's ex-prime minister John Howard and Spain's ex-prime minister Jose Maria Aznar reached the same conclusion about multiculturalism in their countries.  British Prime Minister David Cameron has warned that multiculturalism is fostering extremist ideology and directly contributing to homegrown Islamic terrorism.  UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage said the United Kingdom's push for multiculturalism has not united Britons but pushed them apart.  It has allowed for Islam to emerge despite Britain's Judeo-Christian culture.

Multiculturalism's Leftist Threat to the American Story.  Is multiculturalism a decent if banal posture that basically boils down to respecting other cultures and getting sloshed on St. Patrick's Day and Cinco de Mayo?  Or is it a much darker social model used as a Trojan horse to transform Western society fundamentally, especially this one?  I think both can be true, but I worry only about the fundamental transformation part.

Court tells TUSD to improve teachers' racial diversity.  The Tucson Unified School District has been ordered to improve racial diversity among its teachers.  In a district that has spent years under federal oversight for desegregation efforts, U.S.  District Judge David Bury has told it to reduce by half the number of schools where racial disparities exist among the teaching staff — affecting more than one-third of TUSD schools.

The 'Diversity' Hustle.  If a family of Mexican immigrants opens a taco stand, should they be required to hire a Korean assistant manager for the sake of "diversity"?  Does anyone complain there are "too many" Italians working at the pizza restaurant?  Businesses exist for exactly one reason, to make profit.  Anything that contributes to the goal of making profit is good, and anything that distracts from that goal is bad.  Period.

Diversity compels society give up its traditions, its sacred rights, and even its basic decency.  We can now add Halloween parties to the list of things we can't do because we live in a diverse society notes one Benny Huang, who knows a thing or two about racial diversity.

Diversity: This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things.  Advocates of diversity ought to familiarize themselves with a little thing called "truth in advertising."  Like all ideas, diversity is "sold," in a manner of speaking. Great efforts are made to get the public to buy into the concept that the optimal model for society is a heterogeneous jumble of people who share nothing in common.  The fewer commonalities we have, the better!  That's what diversity means — differentness.  It's enough to make you wonder what the benefits of diversity are; besides the race riots and lack of social cohesion, I mean. [...] They never do.  Diversity is promoted as an unqualified good, something that only a crazy person wouldn't like.  It's all roses, no thorns.

Proof that diversity adds nothing to productivity:
Outrage as Twitter reveals just 49 of its 3,000 US employees are black.  Twitter only has 49 black employees — out of 2,910 staff members in America.  The 35 men and 14 women account for just 1.7 percent of the firm's US operation, which is 93.8 percent white or Asian.  Slamming the figures, released in a compulsory Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) report, Rev Jesse Jackson said people are 'becoming intolerant' of the stilted progress.

The Editor says:
That's right, Jesse.  If only some of those 3,000 employees were black, the company might be successful!

Colonization and Cultural Genocide — and They Call it 'Immigration'.  Remember the old Stanford University chant, led by Jesse Jackson, "Hey, hey, ho, ho, Western Culture's got to go!"?  Well, it's going, going... and will be gone unless we make some profoundly radical changes.  It's cultural and demographic genocide, generally lamented except in the one case in which, labeled diversity, it's trumpeted.  That would be the case of the one civilization leftists hate with every fiber of their being.

School Districts Spending Millions on 'White Privilege' Training for Employees.  The Pacific Educational Group (PEG) espouses a lot of controversial and stereotypical concepts regarding minority students in K-12 schools.  For instance, the organization teaches that black kids are less likely to respond to fundamental ideas like working hard to achieve success, or being on time for school or work, because those ideas are supposedly foreign to African-American culture.  PEG is literally selling notions like that to American public schools, and the schools are buying them, at a cost of millions of tax dollars every year.

The Most Diverse Cities Are Often the Most Segregated.  When I was a freshman at the University of Chicago in 1996, I heard the same thing again and again:  Do not leave the boundaries of Hyde Park.  Do not go north of 47th Street.  Do not go south of 61st Street.  Do not go west of Cottage Grove Avenue.

Farage: The 'Dramatic Failure' Of Multiculturalism Drives Radical Islam.  Why are thousands of European Muslims flocking to radical Islam? According to UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage, "state sponsored multiculturalism" deserves much of the blame for why extremism has found a home in Europe.  "We [the U.K.] have pursued a policy for nearly four decades now of multiculturalism," Farage told The Daily Caller Thursday [2/26/2015].  "We have encouraged division.  Rather than having different communities coming together, under one law, we have encouraged division."  "That policy I think has been a dramatic failure," the Member of European Parliament (MEP) added.

'Diversity' in action.  Islamic terrorist attacks in Europe, and European governments' counter-attacks are more than just a passing news story.  Europe is currently in the process of paying the price for years of importing millions of people from a culture hostile to the fundamental values of Western culture.  And this is by no means the last of the installments of that price, to be paid in blood and lives, for smug elites' Utopian self-indulgences in moral preening and gushing with the magic word "diversity."

UKIP's Farage: Multiculturalism Creating 'Fifth Column' in West.  In the wake of Wednesday's massacre of twelve people at a satirical French newspaper by suspected Islamic fundamentalists, UK Independence Party head Nigel Farage warned that the obsession with fostering a multicultural society has created a "fifth column" in the West.  As leader of the UK's fastest-growing political party, Farage has pushed a British exit from the European Union and a reform of Britain's liberal immigration laws, which his party believes limits economic opportunity for UK citizens and threatens the nation's social fabric — even its physical safety.

Diversity set Ferguson on fire.  Commentators offer different reasons why Ferguson is burning.  They blame racial injustice or militarized police or the police officer who shot an unarmed teenager.  Some even blame Michael Brown.  But all these explanations miss the truth:  Ferguson is symptom, not cause, and the cause is diversity.

POLL: 95 Percent of BBC Viewers Think Multiculturalism Has Failed.  [G]rowing evidence suggests that multiculturalism itself is responsible for increasing segregation in Britain.  Last year the Daily Mail reported on the phenomenon of 'White flight' — that is, white British people moving out of London in vast numbers.  Between 2001 and 2011 some 620,000 white British people left London, tipping the ethnic makeup of London into majority non-British heritage.

Is Black History Month still needed?  How valuable, knowledge-wise, is a single month for youth who have practically the whole of human knowledge at their fingertips on their phones?  Furthermore, these African-American Millennials say they never really learned anything useful during Black History Month activities at school, and they fret that having a formal, month-long observance gives the nation a pass to ignore black history the rest of the year.  Despite all that, they'd keep it.

The downside of diversity.  Diversity can bring risks as well as benefits and perils as well as perks.  There are trade-offs to be made, for example between the trust that comes from sharing a common background and the cultural sensitivity that comes from employing people from different parts of the word.

Why Obama is Uneducated.  A few years ago I participated in a radio debate on "white privilege" with a certain man, whose name is unimportant, who had a Ph.D. in "ethnic studies."  At one point he introduced an argument by saying, "If whites are 80 percent of the population...," which prompted me to interject and point out that whites (non-Hispanic) are now only 63 percent of America.  Of course, you might think that someone with a doctorate in "ethnic studies" would know what the ethnic and racial composition of the country is.

Homosexuals Get Duck Dy-Nasty.  "Tolerance," as it has been marketed, was always a con. [...] For one thing, tolerance always implies a negative, real or perceived; you wouldn't have to tolerate a beautiful car or a delectable meal — you relish those things.  But you might have to tolerate a cold or bad weather.  Thus, tolerance is only noble in two situations:  One is when dealing with something objectively negative that cannot be eliminated, such as irremediable pain.  The other is when confronted with something you don't happen to like and could avoid, but that is objectively good or neutral; an example would be tolerating a food you detest in order to avoid offending your hosts.

Blacks and Obama.  Obama's electoral success further confirms what I've often held:  The civil rights struggle in America is over, and it's won.  At one time, black Americans did not have the constitutional guarantees enjoyed by white Americans; now we do.  The fact that the civil rights struggle is over and won does not mean that there are not major problems confronting many members of the black community, but they are not civil rights problems and have little or nothing to do with racial discrimination.

Lawmaker: Hire more whites to run government.  Robb Pitts, a county commissioner in Atlanta, Ga., says the county needs to hire more whites. [...] Pitts, a black, said, "I would encourage the county manager to find ways to inform all ethnicities when new positions arise and make a concerted effort to diversify our employee base."  That was in a recent email to constituents, and Fulton County Personnel Board Chairman Paul Zucca says still today the workforce "needs more diversity."

The Editor says...
Why not hire the best available workers, instead of the ones that will produce just the right mix of colors?

Multiculturalism is the enemy of democracy.  Here we go again. Brazen and brutal attacks against British and French soldiers.  In broad daylight.  At the hands of homegrown Islamic extremists (Mr. Adebolajo is reported to have shouted "Allahu Akbar!" as he struck).  European conservatives reflexively clamoring for a crackdown on Islamic fundamentalism.  The left reflexing reminding us that the West is not at war with Islam.  This latest horrific chapter of Islamic radicalism brings me back to a topic I have often chronicled over the past 20 years:  the specter of multiculturalism.

Minority Student Needs.  Quack multiculturalism is the name [Professor Craig] Frisby gives to the vision of multiculturalism that promotes the falsehoods and distortions that dominate today's college agenda, sold under various names such as "valuing diversity," "being sensitive to cultural differences" and "cultural competence."  He identifies different brands of multiculturalism such as boutique, Kumbayah, light-and-fluffy, and bean-counting multiculturalism.  Insider language used to promote multiculturalism includes terms such as "practice tolerance," "celebrate diversity," "equity with excellence" and "differences are not deficits."

Confidential, expensive USDA sensitivity training: 'The Pilgrims were illegal aliens'.  Footage of the United States Department of Agriculture's compulsory "Cultural Sensitivity Training" program reveals USDA employees being instructed to refer to the Pilgrims as "illegal aliens" and minorities as "emerging majorities" — at "a huge expense" to taxpayers.  The video clips were made public Thursday evening by the conservative government accountability group Judicial Watch, which obtained them through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request made on May 18, 2012.

Louisiana school that went viral for sending students to elite colleges accused of falsifying transcripts: report.  A southern Louisiana school became an internet sensation after multiple videos showing its underprivileged black students receiving acceptance letters to elite colleges went viral over the past two years.  The school is back in the spotlight after a report from The New York Times that says the school's founders fabricated applications and falsified transcripts, in addition to fostering "a culture of fear with physical and emotional abuse."  Tracey and Michael Landry, the husband-and-wife founders of T.M. Landry College Preparatory School, a private K-12 school in Breaux Bridge, are accused of mining "the worst stereotypes of black America" to play up the students' tales of hardship and academic accomplishments in order to appeal to Ivy League school's hunger for diversity, according to the report.

Louisiana School Made Headlines for Sending Black Kids to Elite Colleges.  Here's the Reality.  T.M. Landry College Prep, a small private school in Louisiana, boasted about its record of sending black students from working class families to top universities.  But there's more to the story.  In reality, the school falsified transcripts, made up student accomplishments and mined the worst stereotypes of black America to manufacture up-from-hardship tales that it sold to Ivy League schools hungry for diversity.  The Landrys also fostered a culture of fear with physical and emotional abuse, students and teachers said.

Identity Politics in Overdrive.  Harvard caps the number of Asians it admits, allege the plaintiffs — a coalition of Asian-American groups called Students for Fair Admissions — in [a] lawsuit against the university.  As a result, Asian applicants must present higher academic qualifications than any other racial or ethnic group in order to be considered for admission.  According to Harvard's own data, test scores and a high school GPA that would give an Asian-American high school senior only a 25 percent chance of admission would provide a virtual admissions guarantee — 95 percent — for an otherwise identical black applicant, a 77 percent chance of admission for a Hispanic student, and a 36 percent chance of admission for a white student.  Asians would make up more than 50 percent of the admitted class if Harvard were colorblind, estimates Students for Fair Admissions, instead of the 18.6 percent Asian average maintained over recent years.

Why The Media Will Never Tell You 85 Percent Of Americans Oppose Race-Based College Admissions.  This week, Harvard University went to trial over the claim it discriminates against Asian-American applicants.  Affirmative action moved back onto the main stage of American politics, particularly as this is an issue where replacing Justice Anthony Kennedy with Justice Brett Kavanaugh could make a difference at the Supreme Court.  Yet the political discussion of this hot-button issue again proceeds with little recognition of a basic fact: racial preferences in college admissions are wildly unpopular.  Eighty-five percent of Americans oppose considering race in the college admissions process, according to "Hidden Tribes," a recent report from the left-of-center group More in Common.  Of the seven "tribes" identified in the report, racial preferences were supported only by progressive activists, the furthest-left 8 percent of Americans.  Ironically, progressive activists are almost the least diverse of the tribes, except the furthest-right 6 percent.

James Madison doesn't want your dead cat to vote, and maybe not you either.  Society's refusal to recognize and reward talent starts early now in the educational system.  College admissions, hiring and promotions are increasingly on the basis of skin color or political outlook, not merit.  The Los Angeles Times reports that the affirmative action czar at UCLA who is tasked with covertly discriminating in favor of certain skin colors and sexual preferences — in violation of the state constitution prohibiting such discrimination — is paid $414,000 a year and presides over an office of 150 employees.  This "Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion" implements the policies of his boss, the president of the university.  Those include written instructions to faculty discouraging them from making statements such as "The most qualified person should get the job."  Because micro-aggression.  I wonder about their grading system.  Are professors also discouraged from giving A's to the students who perform best on the exam?

Harvard Case Could End Affirmative Discrimination.  If there was ever any question why Harvard University officials adamantly opposed the Trump administration's rescinding of Obama-era guidelines for race-based admissions decisions, the answer is now clear.  Students for Fair Admission v. Harvard — set to go to trial October 15 in federal district court in Boston — could expose how affirmative action has morphed into a preferential scheme that sets one minority group against others.  Even worse (and more ironic), modern affirmative action policies such as those being implemented at Harvard grossly violate the very civil rights they were meant to protect in the first place.  Thankfully, the Department of Justice (DOJ) is siding with students and parents who allege Harvard has instituted by stealth a racial-balancing scheme that deliberately limits admissions of highly qualified Asian students in a way that's similar to the strategies used by Ivy League institutions in the early 20th century to exclude Jews.

Park Slope is now ground zero in de Blasio's drive to impose quotas on city schools.  Park Slope is the next front in Mayor de Blasio's drive to remake the city's middle schools — in this case, by eliminating academic screening in admissions in favor of quotas intended to impose racial balance.  And the Department of Education has made it clear that any parents who object will be deemed bigots.

And They Wonder Why We're Angry.  What many parents fail to realize when they send their young people to expensive collegiate educations this week is that the business degree will not be an automatic option.  Business schools consistently maintain the most strict entry standards for admission to their major on college campuses.  Not just anyone can get a business degree.  The business school has standards, and this allows it to keep classes sizes small and the desired social environment positive.  This hypocrisy is but one of thousands that extend from the interpretive class into the suffering public.  Why not let all immigrants from anywhere have immediate free access to a business degree from any of our nation's top universities?

Deactivating Affirmative Action.  The ACT's annual reports show that Asian students consistently score higher than all other ethnic groups on the standardized test.  However, when it comes to Asian applicants, as noted in No Longer Separate, Not Yet Equal, schools seem to have higher standards for them.  According to a Princeton study conducted in 2009, Asians had to score on average 140 points higher on the SAT than whites to have an equal chance at admission.  This discrimination is a direct byproduct of this failing policy.  Clearly, some of the most qualified applicants are being rejected in order for the school to boast a diverse pool of acceptances.  In 2014, a lawsuit was filed against Harvard accusing admissions of having an unconstitutional cap on Asian acceptances, as the percentage of Asians in Harvard's student body had remained about 16 percent to 19 percent for two decades even though the Asian-American percentage of the population had more than doubled.  Therefore, in the attempt to diversify the class, these top-tiered colleges seem to make use of a quota-like system in order to boast their commitment diversity, but in reality, they are ousting qualified candidates simply because of their race.

Trump administration ditches Obama's guidelines which told colleges to consider applicants' race to increase diversity.  The Trump administration plans to encourage colleges to ignore race in their admissions process, abandoning guidelines that called on universities to consider race as a way of promoting diversity, it was reported on Tuesday [7/3/2018].  The guidelines, put in place under President Barack Obama in 2011 and 2016, presented legal recommendations that Trump administration officials contend 'mislead schools to believe that legal forms of affirmative action are simpler to achieve than the law allows,' the Wall Street Journal reported, citing two people familiar with the plans.

Trump admin pushes colleges to drop Obama-era affirmative action policy.  The Trump administration is urging colleges not to consider race in their admissions process, reversing an Obama-era guideline that encouraged affirmative action to boost diversity.  The move, reported by multiple news outlets, restores the policy under then-President George W. Bush that encouraged "race-neutral methods" in college admissions.  Plans to launch the new policy were first reported Tuesday [7/3/2018] by The Wall Street Journal.

Harvard Isn't Interested In Meritocracy or Asians.  [Scroll down]  The worm in the apple here is that Harvard offers an illusion of meritocracy.  But its aim is preparing future leaders.  Rather than letting in the brightest and most dedicated students.  And its notion of leadership qualities has only so much to do with academic merit.  That is why there's an extensive industry dedicated to helping parents get their children into those high end schools.  Some Asian parents have been paying thousands to tens of thousands of dollars just for the image management side of things.  Diversity is a much more important value than merit in academia.  And while that serves as an unofficial quota on white people.  It serves as a quota on Asian people too.

NYC's War on Academic Excellence.  While student "Dreamers" here illegally from south of the border garner bleeding-heart front-page stories and nightly news dispatches, the high-achieving sons and daughters of legal immigrants from Asia are getting shafted by far-left Democrats.  And it's all in the perverted name of "diversity."

Illegal U: An Immigration Scam in Plain Sight.  The notion of establishing a college intended for an otherwise illegal alien market flabbergasted me some 20 years ago when I evaluated some categories of colleges for the State of Virginia.  In my brief time (1999-2000) at Virginia's State Council of Higher Education (SCHEV), I examined the credentials of marginal, for-profit colleges, which sometimes had high portions of foreign students.  Their administrations were dominated by foreign men.  At least one emphasized its ties with a foreign nation.  In one egregious instance, I found clear signs of dishonesty:  the school claimed faculty who denied to me they had anything to do with the institution.  Other faculty listed inflated their credentials.  SCHEV did nothing, claiming the agency lacked the resources to do a thorough examination of each applicant for institutional approval.  Other schools had ties to foreign countries that compromised their integrity as academic institutions.

Black-On-Black Racism At Cornell.  Cornell University's Black Students United [...] complains that the prestigious Ivy League school admits too many blacks — from Africa and the Caribbean.  "We demand that Cornell Admissions to come up with a plan to actively increase the presence of underrepresented Black students on this campus," the BSU student group said in its demands.  "We define underrepresented Black students as Black Americans who have several generations (more than two) in this country."  Hold the phone.  Isn't the mantra of modern higher education "diversity," "inclusion" and "overcoming disadvantage"?  If so, the black African and Caribbean students would seem to nail all three.  Maybe the problem is that it is tough to explain why so many black foreign applicants outperform America-born blacks on what some call "culturally biased" standardized tests.

Democrats Pressure the Federal Government to Support Racial Discrimination.  Top Democrats in Congress are pressuring the Justice and Education Departments to stop the administration's plans to investigate and potentially sue universities that intentionally discriminate against applicants based on race.  In their letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, Senator Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.), Representative John Conyers (D., Mich.), and others embrace the Alice in Wonderland worldview in which curtailing racial discrimination "would undermine civil rights protections."

Affirmative Action Has Failed.  It Never Had a Chance to Succeed.  After decades of affirmative action, billions of dollars invested in finding, mentoring, and recruiting minority students, and extraordinary levels of effort and experimentation, black and Hispanic students are "more underrepresented at the nation's top colleges and universities than they were 35 years ago" (emphasis added).  White and Asian students, on the other hand, remain overrepresented as a percentage of the population, with Asian students most overrepresented of all.  On the one hand, these statistics represent a staggering failure.  It's difficult to overstate the modern campus obsession with diversity.  To judge from marketing materials, campus investments, and the explosive growth of diversity bureaucracies, increasing minority representation on campus isn't just a priority on par with, say, a good math, English, or engineering department, it's deemed to be an indispensable part of a high-quality college education.  That's the legal rationale that's used to justify racial discrimination in college admissions — that there is a "compelling state interest" in creating a truly diverse educational experience.  On the other hand, however, one wonders whether failure was inevitable.  Not even the most aggressive of affirmative-action programs can find students who don't exist.  And when it comes to college admissions, the problem isn't a lack of collegiate demand for qualified minority students but rather a serious deficiency in supply.  There are simply not enough students who are ready, willing, and able to do the work.

Trump, Justice to tackle affirmative action against whites.  President Donald Trump's Department of Justice is reportedly poised to launch some civil rights investigations, and perhaps lawsuits, against those colleges and universities that discriminate against applicants based on skin color — and hold on, it's not what you think.  White people, get ready to be shocked.  Justice is turning critical eyes at schools that wrongfully keep out whites.  That's what a read-between-the-lines look at an internal Justice Department memo suggests, anyway, at least to The New York Times.  And if true, hold the phone.  It'll be hard to gauge whose scream is louder, Barack Obama's or Eric Holder's.  Either way, Black Lives Matter and George Soros just found a new fundraiser.

Harvard makes diversity history:  Majority of incoming freshman class are not white.  Harvard University's incoming freshman class will be unlike any since its founding in 1636 — the majority of students are non-white.  The institution, which has made a concerted effort in recent years to become more diverse, confirmed that 50.8 percent of its class of 2021 are non-white.

Justice Dept to tackle college admissions racial discrimination, left freaks out.  If a report in the NY Times is accurate, the Trump administration is getting ready to take on the most precious of liberal dogmas, the institutionalized racial discrimination in college admissions, aka affirmative action.  The Times reaches the conclusion that affirmative action will be under attack, even though the documents it has obtained for its reporting don't actually say that.

Students vote to give blacks free tuition at Western Kentucky University.  The student government at Western Kentucky University on Tuesday [4/18/2017] voted in favor of giving free tuition to black students.  The school's Student Government Association passed a resolution by 19-10 supporting slavery reparations for black students in the form of free tuition and free access to the public Bowling Green campus.  The resolution also recommends that the university create a task force to "assess the feasibility of test-optional admissions and geographically-weighted admissions," claiming that some standardized testing poses a disadvantage for needy students and perpetuates inequality and "white supremacy," The Bowling Green Daily News reported.

Debate over in-state tuition for students in US illegally.  Twenty states already offer cheaper in-state college tuition to students who are in the United States illegally.  Legislation making its way through the Tennessee Legislature would make that state the 21st.

Wisconsin students group demands free tuition for black students.  The student government at the University of Wisconsin-Madison said on Wednesday [2/15/2017] that black students should be offered free tuition and housing because blacks were legally barred from education during slavery and university remains out of reach for black students today.  The Associated Students of Madison said in a resolution that suburban high school students are over-represented.  The group said consideration of ACT and SAT scores in applications upholds "white supremacy" because it restricts opportunities for the poor.  The college has proposed measures aimed at improving diversity.

The 'Diversity' Fraud.  It is common, at colleges and universities across the country, for the test scores of Asian American students who have been admitted to a given college to be higher than the test scores of whites or of blacks or Hispanics.  That may not seem strange, since that is true of test scores in general.  But, at any given institution, applying the same standards to all, the test scores of students at a particular institution would tend to be similar.  More Asian Americans would be admitted to higher ranked colleges and universities, however, if the same standards were applied to all.  In short, something very much like the quota limits that were applied to Jews in the past are now being applied to Asian Americans — and, once again, are being justified by diversity.  But what justifies diversity?  Nothing but unsupported assertions, repeated endlessly, piously and loudly.

Beating Affirmative Actions.  Affirmative action, for liberals, is a means toward the end of egalitarianism.  The policy originally sought to end discrimination in government employment but expanded into a quota system that taxpayer-funded universities use against Caucasian women such as Abigail Fisher, Jennifer Gratz, and Barbara Grutter.  Affirmative action also discriminates against Asian-Americans.  The University of Texas policy that led to Fisher sought to increase African-American and Hispanic enrollment while ignoring Asian-Americans, who have higher average SAT scores.  In amicus briefs, the Asian American Legal Foundation noted that ["]racial preferences in college admissions programs ... discriminate against Asian-American applicants by deeming them overrepresented relative to their demographics in the population and thus less worthy of admission than applicants of underrepresented races.["]

Conservative club's 'affirmative action bake sale' draws scrutiny.  The Young Conservatives of Texas club at the University of Texas at Austin sparked outrage Wednesday after hosting an "affirmative action bake sale" and charging people different prices based on their race and sex.  The Dallas Morning News reported that a cookie at the sale cost $1.50 for Asian males, $1 for white males and 50 cents for African-American and Hispanic males.  Native American men and women were given free cookies.  Asian women had to pay $1.25, white women 75 cents and Hispanic and African-American women 25 cents.

Supreme Court Upholds Affirmative Action in College Admissions.  The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday [6/23/2016] upheld the affirmative action program at the University of Texas at Austin, ending a protracted legal battle.  The vote was 4-3.  It was not immediately clear how far-reaching the ruling will be because of the specifics of the Texas program at issue.  However, the court offered a grudging agreement that in the Texas case the program is needed.

New App Helps Illegal Aliens Access U.S. College Scholarships.  Sarahi Espinoza Salamanca found it hard to find money for college after graduating from North Hollywood High School in Southern California.  She was brought to the state illegally from Mexico by her parents when she was 4, but following a free K-12 education, she faced paying tuition for college — something she said she could not afford. [...] The app also has a map that tells illegal aliens which states allow them to pay in-state tuition and which states allow them to pay in-state tuition, plus have access to financial aid.  The article explained that Salamanca started the app after winning $100,000 in the Voto Latinos Innovator Challenge contest and also received $25,000 from an anonymous donor.  Salamanca is now, the article said, in the U.S. legally and has been honored by the Obama administration and Facebook.

Reaction to the article above:
Illegal Alien Gets a Free Education.  [Scroll down]  My knee-jerk reaction was to exclaim, which I did out loud — boo-freaking-hoo!  Poor illegal immigrant brought to our country illegally, which means her and her family is not supposed to be here in the first place and after receiving an entirely free American education (as well as a myriad of other freebies) now has the nerve to whine about having to pay for college.  That is bad enough, but it gets worse.  Rather than sucking it up and finding a way to pay for college, or just not going, "Salamancadecided to find a way to help illegal aliens gain access to college scholarships..."  She created an app called the DREAMer's Roundup.  Only inAmerica!  The app creates a database of scholarships for illegals and already has at least 500 available.

Misleading and Using Blacks.  The issue for black parents is not whether their sons and daughters should be admitted to an elite college or one that is lower-ranked.  The issue is whether their sons and daughters should be admitted to a college where they would not be admitted if they were white.  The question for black parents and black people is:  Which better serves our interests, a black student's being admitted to an elite college and winding up in the bottom of his class or flunking out or a black student's being admitted to a less prestigious college and performing just as well as his white peers?  I would opt for a black student's doing well and graduating from a less prestigious college.

Brown University unveils $100 million plan to address campus diversity.  Brown University has unveiled a $100 million plan aimed at boosting diversity on its Rhode Island campus over the next 10 years, including doubling the number of faculty members from minority and other underrepresented populations.  The plan is spelled out in a 19-page document that Brown President Christina Paxson posted on the Ivy League university's website earlier this week.

Critics blast $20M Cal-Berkeley fund for race-based scholarships, hiring.  The $20 million fund unveiled by a top California university last month to endow scholarships for African-American students and to hire diverse faculty is just the latest attempt to get around a state law barring schools from using racial preferences in admissions, according to critics, who are vowing yet another legal battle.  University of California-Berkeley's "African-American Initiative" would raise funds from private non-profits to fund "a comprehensive effort to address the underrepresentation of African-American students, faculty and staff at our university, and improve the climate for those who are here now and all who will join our community in the future."  The money would go to scholarships for black students, the hiring of race-specific clinical psychologists and fostering a more diverse faculty and senior management, according to the school.

Whitewash: Kroll left dozens of bad LSATs out of UT report.  An investigation into the corruption of admissions standards at the University of Texas School of Law confirmed Watchdog's reports that dozens of applicants had been admitted to UT Law despite atrocious test scores.  Nonetheless, Kroll Associates made no mention in its final report of the dozens of inadequate Law School Admission Test scores it found in researching applicant data from 2004 to 2014.

The Editor says...
How many of the students with "atrocious test scores" were admitted due to affirmative action quotas?

Rachel Dolezal sued Howard University for discriminating against her because she's white.  This was in 2002, before the "transition." [...] She lost the suit but Dolezal's issues with Howard were well known to her family.  Her history with the school is fascinating, in fact, and may be a window onto why she began to try to pass as black in the first place.

More about Rachel Dolezal.

Why I faked being black for med school.  In the early 1990s, the Division of Community and Minority Programs of the Association of American Medical Colleges devised Project 3,000 by 2000.  This program set the quantitative target (a quota — official or unofficial) of increasing minority enrollment in US medical schools from 1,584 to 3,000 between 1990 to 2000.  Many medical schools, including St. Louis University, where I eventually attended, jumped on this program.  But the question was whether, in order to achieve their quantitative goal, medical schools were compromising their academic standards, or were they simply going to aggressively recruit minority students?

Asian-American groups accuse Harvard of racial bias in admissions.  A coalition of Asian-American groups filed a federal complaint against Harvard University on Friday alleging the school engaged in "systemic and continuous discrimination" against Asian Americans during its admissions process.  More than 60 Chinese, Indian, Korean and Pakistani groups came together for the complaint, which was filed with the civil rights offices at the justice and education departments.  They are calling for an investigation into Harvard and other Ivy League institutions that they say should stop using racial quotas or racial balancing in admission.

Liberal Affirmative Action Racism Facing New Threat.  Finally, push is about to come to shove regarding the systemic racism exercised in the name of diversity.  Almost anyone paying attention realizes that nearly all elite universities and colleges discriminate against Asian-Americans in admissions policy.  In those rare elite campuses that don't discriminate, such as the University of California system (where voters passed an initiative outlawing it) and California Institute of Technology, the most selective campuses have 40% to 50% Asian-American undergraduate student bodies.  But elsewhere, the numbers are far lower.  Now, a large coalition organizations representing Asian-Americans has filed a formal complaint with the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights.

Mindy Kaling's Brother Says He Got Into Medical School By Posing As Black.  On a website promoting his book, [Vijay] Chokalingam writes that he realized when he was a junior at the University of Chicago he didn't have the grades or the MCAT score to get into medical school.  According to Chokalingam, he had a GPA of 3.1 and a score of 31 on the MCAT, which ranks in the 80-85 percentile for the test.  "Still, I was determined to become a doctor and I knew that admission standards for certain minorities under affirmative action were, let's say... less stringent?" he writes.

Asians Penalized 50 Points On SAT — Black Students Given 230 Bonus Points.  Don't let your jaw drop too far, this fundamental change is not just happening in college application processes.  This exact same methodology is also being applied to Credit Scores for home mortgages and car loans.

Harvard Affirmative Action Lawsuit Could Decrease African American Students by 50% at Elite Universities.  On Monday [11/17/2014], federal lawsuits against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill were filed alleging that both universities discriminated against white and Asian American students as a result of their race-based affirmative action policies.  Moreover, according to an AP article, the lawsuit against Harvard alleges that the prestigious university has a limit for the number of Asian Americans it admits each year.

Affirmative action lawsuits hit Harvard and UNC.  Lawsuits filed Monday [11/17/2014] against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill argue that affirmative action policies should be banned at colleges across the nation.  The federal suits allege Harvard and UNC rely on race-based affirmative action policies that impact admissions of high-achieving white and Asian-American students.  The Harvard lawsuit also contends that the Ivy League university specifically limits the number of Asian-Americans it admits each year.

Muslim Sues Latino Caucus for Not Giving Her Latino Scholarship.  A Muslim student with a Muslim father and Latino mother is suing the Illinois Legislative Latino Caucus Foundation (ILLCF) for not giving her a scholarship even though she was a mediocre student and was accused of faking a letter of recommendation.

University of Texas can use race as factor in admissions, court rules.  The University of Texas can consider race in undergraduate admissions to promote diversity, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday [7/15/2014].  Acting in a lawsuit that the U.S. Supreme Court had sent back last year, Judge Patrick Higginbotham wrote that considering race boosted the university's efforts to assemble a diverse student body.  "Universities may use race as part of a holistic admissions program where it cannot otherwise achieve diversity," Higginbotham wrote.  "This interest is compelled by the reality that university education is more the shaping of lives than the filling of heads with facts — the classic assertion of the humanities."

The Editor says...
In other words, indoctrination and multiculturalism are more important than marketable skills.

UCLA prof says stats prove school's admissions illegally favor blacks.  Public universities in California are barred from using race as a factor in admitting students, but a UCLA professor who once served on its admissions oversight team says he has proof they do it anyway.  While the first round of admissions consideration is handled fairly, African-American students are nearly three times as likely to make it out of the "maybe" pile than equally-qualified white students, and more than twice as likely as Asians, according to Tim Groseclose, a political science professor at the school and author of a new book [...]

Coming End to Racial Preferences.  Last week's U.S. Supreme Court 6-2 ruling in Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action et al. upheld Michigan's constitutional amendment that bans racial preferences in admission to its public universities.  Justice Sonia Sotomayor lashed out at her colleagues in a bitter dissent, calling them "out of touch with reality."  She went on to make the incredible argument that the amendment, which explicitly forbids racial discrimination, itself amounts to racial discrimination.  Her argument was that permissible "race-sensitive admissions policies," the new name for racial preferences, both serve the compelling interest of obtaining the educational benefits that flow from a diverse student body and inure people to the benefit of racial minorities.  By the way, no one has come up with hard evidence of the supposed "educational benefits" that come from a racially mixed student body, and there's mounting evidence of harm done to minorities through academic mismatching.

In Washington, It's Politics "By Any Means Necessary".  The Supreme Court, in a moment of unusual clarity, ruled last week that the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment did not prohibit states from requiring public universities to treat applicants of different races equally.  Or, in other words, equal protection is not opposed to (14th Amendment) equal protection.  It is a powerful testimony to the Orwellian nature of our legal world that such a question arose in the first place and that two Justices could be found to dissent from the ruling.  The full name of the original plaintiff, however, reveals much:  "Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, Integration and Immigration Rights and Fight for Equality By Any Means Necessary."

Supreme Court Upholds Michigan Affirmative Action Ban.  The justices said in a 6-2 ruling Tuesday [4/22/2014] that Michigan voters had the right to change their state constitution to prohibit public colleges and universities from taking account of race in admissions decisions.

Supreme Court upholds Michigan's ban on affirmative action in college admissions.  In upholding a ban on the use of race in admission decisions at Michigan's public universities, the U.S. Supreme Court didn't end affirmative action — they just very strongly upheld the right of voters to ban it.

Antonin Scalia faults Sonia Sotomayor for 'doubly shameful' suggestion that Michigan voters are racist.  Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia faulted Justice Sonia Sotomayor for making what he regards as a "shameful" suggestion that the Michigan voters who decided to ban affirmative action in college admissions were motivated by racism.  Scalia wrote a concurring opinion upholding a 2006 ballot initiative that amended Michigan's constitution to ban affirmative action. [...] Sotomayor, in her dissent, opened by describing three stages of "the majority" discriminating against racial minorities in the political process, beginning with the Jim Crow laws that flouted the 15th Amendment.

Krauthammer: 'Leave the decision of affirmative action up to the people.  Charles Krauthammer told viewers Tuesday on "Special Report with Bret Baier" that Tuesdays Supreme Court opinion that effectively ends affirmative action at public universities in Michigan was a sound decision.  "The left is trying to institutionalize affirmative action to make it impossible for any legislature or any referendum ever to abolish it ever in the history of the country," the syndicated columnist and Fox News contributor said.  "An outrageous proposition that was rejected by the court."  Krauthammer said the issue should be decided on a state-by-state basis.

Court's affirmative action ruling: A step towards respecting states' rights.  With its ruling upholding the right of Michigan voters to ban racial preferences in state university admissions, the Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts on Tuesday took what legal scholars are saying one more step away from the concept of federal supremacy.  The 6-2 decision reversed a 2012 ruling by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals that struck down the voter initiative on the grounds that it violated the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection Clause, and carved out more power for the states over Washington in the process.

Raced-Based Preferences Forever.  What was called "racial quotas" in the 1970s and has been referred to as "affirmative action" since the 1990s is giving way to a new term:  "race-sensitive admission policies."  The language shift is telling — race-based preferences are losing intellectual, judicial, and political support. — Yesterday, the Supreme Court voted six to two to uphold the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative (MCRI), which was passed with support from 58 percent of that state's voters in 2006.  It simply enshrines in Michigan's constitution that the state should not engage in race discrimination.  Opponents of the initiative sued, claiming the measure discriminated against racial minorities who might wish to lobby for preferential treatment.

A Lack of Affirmative Action Isn't Why Minority Students Are Suffering.  In a 6-2 decision, the Court held that a ballot initiative by Michigan residents to bar the use of race preferences as a factor of admission was constitutional.  On a Court that has consistently issued closely contested opinions — often in 5-4 decisions — the overwhelming majority of the Justices recognized the importance and the legality of people in several states like Michigan to prohibit the use of race as a factor in admissions.  Despite the commentary to the contrary which is likely to follow in the coming days, the Court did not address whether colleges or universities could use race as a factor of admission — they wisely left the decision to the voters in individual states to make such a decision.

Supreme Court upholds Michigan's ban on racial preferences in university admissions.  The Supreme Court on Tuesday [4/22/2014] made clear that states are free to prohibit the use of racial considerations in university admissions, upholding Michigan's constitutional amendment banning affirmative action.  By a vote of 6 to 2, the court concluded that it was not up to judges to overturn the 2006 decision by Michigan voters to bar consideration of race when deciding who gets into the state's universities.

Going Negative On Affirmative Action.  The good news about yesterday's Supreme Court ruling is that it affirmed the right of the people to ban racial preferences in university admissions.  The bad news is that it didn't go further.

Scalia's plain truth on affirmative action.  [The US Supreme Court] issued a major ruling that upheld Michigan's 2006 constitutional amendment banning the use of affirmative action as a factor for admission in the state's public universities.  That amendment had been adjoined to the state's constitution following an election in which nearly 4 million votes were cast — and in which the side supporting the amendment prevailed by a 16-point margin, 58 percent to 42 percent.  No matter; in a highly provocative 2011 ruling, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals declared it unconstitutional.  The Supreme Court on Tuesday, with a 6-2 vote, threw the 6th Circuit's ludicrous decision onto the trash heap of history's discarded ideas.

Justice Sotomayor and the affirmative action bitter-enders have lost bigtime.  There is a growing body of experience indicating that the phenomenon known as "mismatch" results in minorities being placed in situations where they cannot compete with the more-qualified students who received no such preferences.  The results have been high drop-out rates, leaving failed students worse off than if they had been admitted to institutions where their qualifications were similar to those of other students.  This is precisely what has happened with the end of racial preferences in California following the passage of Proposition 209.

The 'Wise Latina jumped the shark.  Justice Sonia Sotomayor jumped the shark Tuesday with her lengthy dissent from the Schuette decision, read aloud from the bench.  Although the liberal media sympathize with her and presented the decision as a setback, the positions she took are at variance with both the clear meaning of the text of the Constitution and with the sentiments of the vast majority of Americans, who consistently vote against racial preferences whenever they get the chance.

Half a Win on Racial Discrimination.  There's a reason they call it "progressivism" — for years, the main legal question contested in affirmative-action cases, from Bakke to Grutter, was whether the state should be allowed to engage in racial discrimination.  In the Michigan affirmative-action case decided today [4/22/2014], Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, the question was whether the state should be required to engage in racial discrimination.  The progress, then, has followed the Left's familiar ratchet-effect model, inching its way from "not forbidden" to "compulsory."  Indeed, as the Wall Street Journal put it, the question here was not whether the use of racial discrimination for putatively benevolent purposes is constitutional but whether states "may end racial preferences without violating the U.S. Constitution."

What Race Preferences Hide.  Any person attempting to overcome hardship can look to Sotomayor for inspiration.  But as she demonstrated in her long, impassioned dissent in the case of Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, the experience of benefiting from race preferences has left her prickly and defensive on the subject.  As others, including her Supreme Court colleague Justice Clarence Thomas, have argued, that kind of gnawing insecurity is one of the consequences of preferences.  Others are never sure if you've achieved your position entirely on merit, and neither are you.

Finally getting it right on affirmative action.  Every once in a while a great, conflicted country gets an insoluble problem exactly right.  Such is the Supreme Court's ruling this week on affirmative action.  It upheld a Michigan referendum prohibiting the state from discriminating either for or against any citizen on the basis of race.  The Schuette ruling is highly significant for two reasons:  its lopsided majority of 6 to 2, including a crucial concurrence from liberal Justice Stephen Breyer, and, even more important, Breyer's rationale.  It couldn't be simpler.  "The Constitution foresees the ballot box, not the courts, as the normal instrument for resolving differences and debates about the merits of these programs."

Justice Sonia Sotomayor proves herself not so wise.  Justice Sonia Sotomayor this week took the unusual step of reading her dissent in a case involving state-sponsored affirmative action in Michigan.  In doing so, she showed herself not only petulant to be on the losing side in a 6-2 decision, but unable to divorce her legal reasoning from her own sense of racial grievance.  It was an embarrassing but predictable performance.  In 2009, I was one of a handful of witnesses who testified against Sotomayor's confirmation before the Senate Judiciary Committee.  I did so with sadness, because there is much to admire in Sotomayor's personal history.

Asians Derail Affirmative Action In California.  The express train hurtling to return racial preference admissions to California — in the form of State Constitutional Amendment 5, which if placed on the ballot and approved by voters would have overturned Prop. 209  — has just been derailed by an outburst of opposition from Asian Americans.  The eruption of opposition caught SCA 5's Democratic sponsors by surprise and caused a crucial three Asian American senators to withdraw their support, depriving the measure of the two thirds senate majority required to place an initiative on the ballot.

Racial spoils system starting to fall apart in California.  California's ruling Democrats are in danger of splintering their coalition over an attempt to re-introduce affirmative action, which has been banned ever since the passage of Proposition 209 in 1996, which banned the use of racial preferences by the state, including in higher education.

Racial Preferences Under Siege.  Two recent events, one on the West Coast and one on the East Coast, demonstrate that after half a century, support for racial preferences in college admissions is getting more and more unsustainable — both politically and intellectually.  In California, liberals have long deplored the 1996 passage of Proposition 209, which banned racial preferences at state universities.  Its backers pointed out that the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which is often cited as the authority for mandating preferential treatment for racial minorities, actually forbids all racial discrimination.  "It is a sordid business, this divvying us up by race," Supreme Court chief justice John Roberts has concluded.

Supreme Court justices' comments seem to favor Michigan affirmative action ban.  The Supreme Court appeared eager during oral arguments Tuesday [10/15/2013] to uphold a Michigan ban on affirmative action, with the justices even considering whether they would need to overrule previous precedents to make sure the state's color-blind school admissions requirement can remain in place.

False Equality in Michigan.  Can a state's citizens amend the state constitution to ban affirmative action programs in public universities, even if the Supreme Court has approved those programs?  That is the question the court is facing this week in the case of Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action.  The court last considered an affirmative action case out of Michigan in 2003, when it upheld the race-conscious admissions policy of the University of Michigan Law School.

Black Skin Privilege.  This collectivist view of guilt and debts that erases individuals and their accountability is now entrenched in America's institutional framework.  In the 1970s, affirmative action was successfully redefined to mean racial preferences for non-whites, and a new standard was set for admissions policies at universities across the United States.  Though black students' median SAT scores in any given year were at least 200 points lower than the median for white students,' blacks were admitted to virtually all academically competitive schools at much higher rates. [...] Inevitably the racial bias does not stop with the admissions process.  Once a university accepts black students, under-qualified for that school though they may be, it is imperative that they remain in school and eventually graduate, poor performance notwithstanding.

Elite colleges confronting failure of affirmative action.  A new report from researchers at Georgetown University must be horrifying diversicrats at elite colleges and universities.  The report's title, "Separate and Unequal: How Higher Education Reinforces the Intergenerational Reproduction of White Racial Privilege," gives away the conclusion of the study.  Despite all the efforts at affirmative action, as a whole, the top tier of colleges is making racial inequality worse, rather than better.

School Administrators at NC University Allegedly Inflate Grades of African-American Students.  Two things immediately come to mind when reading these allegations:  First, not only is it immoral and presumably in violation of the school's honor code to inflate grades for undeserving students, but it's completely unfair to those whom [sic] worked hard for the grades they undoubtedly earned.  And second, how offensive!  The notion that any group of students — merely because of the color of their skin — needs to be "taken care of" by a small group of "administrators" is repugnant on its face.

Abigail Fisher says she's confident UT 'won't be able to use race in the future'.  Abigail Fisher, a 23-year-old at the center of this year's Supreme Court case on affirmative action, predicts that Monday's [6/24/2013] decision will mark the end of race-based admissions at the University of Texas.  Just hours after the court sent her case back to the district level, Fisher said the decision brought the nation "closer to a day when student's race isn't used at all in students' admissions."

Race discussion may crowd out scandals in wake of Supreme Court affirmative action decision.  Get set for a Supreme Court decision that could alter or even end affirmative action.  Or not.  Predicting SCOTUS decisions is hazardous, but Fisher v University of Texas could plunge the nation into heated discussion of the role of racial preferences in education and beyond.

The Real Damage from Racial Preferences in College Admissions.  Three members of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, Todd Gaziano, Gail Heriot, and Peter Kirsanow, filed an amicus brief with the Supreme Court in the Fisher case.  Their Commission found "extensive empirical research" showing that "students who attend schools where their entering academic credentials put them in the bottom of the class are less likely to follow through" pursuing a major in science or engineering than other students with similar credentials "who attend schools where their credentials put them in the middle or top of the class."  The Commission found the same thing to be true in law schools [...]

Even in Medical School, Affirmative Action Rules.  When it comes to becoming a physician, the academic rigors, years of schooling, and personal sacrifice common to the effort are well-known.  This process is a sort of rite of passage, an intellectual marathon that only the best and brightest can complete.  As such, medical schools should select candidates best-suited to excel throughout school and cultivate the skills that will allow them to practice in the best health care system in the world.  The process by which these candidates are selected, however, may come as a shock.

Equal Treatment Under the Law.  Ward Connerly says the Supreme Court's upcoming ruling in Fisher v. University of Texas may help kill racial preferences once and for all.